Ether liquidations hit $356 million, topping bitcoin in $1.19 billion crypto flush
In brief
- Ether liquidations hit about $356 million in 24 hours, versus $298 million for bitcoin, CoinDesk reported.
- Ether took about six times bitcoin's liquidation damage relative to market value, by CoinDesk's calculation.
- Total crypto liquidations reached $1.19 billion, with over $1 billion coming from longs.
- Hyperliquid saw the largest single wipeout: a nearly $20 million ether position.
Ether took the outsized hit
CoinDesk's math is blunt. Measured against market size, ether took about six times the damage bitcoin did: roughly $1.2 million in liquidations for every $1 billion of market value, compared with about $180,000 for bitcoin. (A liquidation is what happens when losses on a leveraged bet eat through a trader's collateral and the exchange closes the position automatically.)
Ether fell more than 3% to about $2,490, while bitcoin lost about 1%. The largest single wipeout was a nearly $20 million ether position on Hyperliquid, a decentralized exchange for leveraged trading.
Other tokens weren't spared. SOL liquidations totaled $71 million, XRP $34 million and NEAR $25 million, and every other token combined added about $119 million.
What CoinDesk tied to the slide
Bitcoin slid from about $83,200 to as low as roughly $80,400 late Thursday. CoinDesk's account links the move to Fed minutes showing most officials expected another rate hike before year-end, plus a report that the Pentagon was preparing for renewed combat in Iran, which pushed oil higher. The outlet also said Ethereum researcher Justin Drake's warning that AI could break the math securing crypto wallets sooner than expected added to the nerves.
Leverage set the stage. Traders had piled it on all week as bitcoin traded between $83,000 and $87,000, according to the report.
Now it's the shorts
Bitcoin recovered to about $82,200 after President Trump said the U.S. wouldn't strike Iran before the midterms, CoinDesk reported. About 78% of the roughly $25 million liquidated over the prior four hours came from short positions, and in the prior hour alone shorts made up nearly $12 million of about $13 million.
Bitcoin sat about $800 below $83,000, the level where Thursday's selling began.
It's a big flush, but it isn't a record (not even close). The rebound and short squeeze come a day before the anniversary of Oct. 10, 2025, when a record $19 billion was liquidated in a single day, roughly 16 times Thursday's total.
Frequently asked questions
What is a crypto liquidation?
A liquidation happens when losses on a leveraged position eat through the collateral a trader put up, and the exchange closes the position automatically. In the late-Thursday slide, $1.19 billion was liquidated across crypto over 24 hours, CoinDesk reported.
How much worse were ether liquidations than bitcoin's relative to market size?
By CoinDesk's calculation, ether took about six times the damage relative to its size. Its liquidations came to roughly $1.2 million per $1 billion of market value, compared with about $180,000 for bitcoin. In dollar terms, ether saw about $356 million versus $298 million for bitcoin.
